


Reaching out

by OTPshipper98



Series: Harry Potter in English [4]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 8th year, Angst and Feels, Awkward Conversations, Bickering, Crying, Drarry Discord Writers Corner Drabble Challenge, Friends to Lovers, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mention of canonical minor character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-23
Updated: 2018-09-23
Packaged: 2019-07-16 03:58:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16077926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OTPshipper98/pseuds/OTPshipper98
Summary: Harry has already seen Malfoy cry, but this time he's determined to make things right.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Wohoo! This is the first time I participate on this challenge, and it would have never been possible for me to finish this drabble with exactly 191 words without Fleetofshippyships' help, so Kudos to her!! Enjoy!

Harry slid into the train compartment. Malfoy was on his own, curled on the seat with his forehead pressed to his knees. _Crying._

Harry felt a shiver of guilt, but stepped forward. “Hey, Malfoy.”

“ _What_?” Malfoy tried to sound rude, but the sob that escaped him was broken and pathetic.

“I wanted to check on you.”

“Why?”

Harry closed the distance between them. “Well, I don't know, but you clearly need it.”

Malfoy snorted. “Just leave, Potter.”

“Ugh, Malfoy. Could you stop being rude for one bloody second and actually listen to me?”

Harry's growl of frustration had the desired effect. Malfoy raised his head, wiping his eyes with an angry gesture.

When he didn't speak, Harry sat by his side. “I just wanted to know how you feel. You're not my enemy anymore, I don't want you to feel alone.”

“Then go tell my friends to move their arses back to Hogwarts and stop being cowards,” Malfoy spat. “Go bring Crabbe back from the dead.”

“I can’t do that… but I can be here for you if you let me.”

Malfoy smiled weakly. “You might regret that offer.”

“Try me.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gaaah I wrote this continuation today, and I'm so impatient that I haven't asked anyone to beta read it ^-^" so any SPaG mistakes are entirely my responsibility! Anyway, hope you enjoy <3

“Potter?”

Potter’s head snapped up. His whole face was soaked in tears, but he managed to frown and set his jaw.

“Go away.”

Draco huffed. “Like hell I’m gonna do that!”

He started towards Potter’s crouched figure, determined to make him feel better like Potter had done for him on the train. But then Potter growled, punched the floor and screamed, “I said _leave_!” And Draco was frozen in place.

He should have left. He didn’t do well with violent people, and especially not with a violent Potter. But then, just as he was turning around, he heard another sob. It was mournful and heart-wrenching, and it must have had some sort of binding magic to it, because Draco found himself almost _running_ towards the git.

Potter didn’t look at him again, and Draco just stood there for a good fifteen seconds. Crap, he hadn’t thought this through. “Why are you crying?”

“Non’fyebusiness,” Harry muttered.

“Is it because of the she-Weasel?” Draco cringed as soon as the words were out. He was sick of being cruel. He’d witnessed so much cruelty before his own eyes, in his own house, and he just… he just wanted to forget. He wanted to be different. But the question had slipped, and it was too late to take it back.

Weirdly enough, Potter just snorted. “ _No_ _,_ ” he spat. He seemed to want to say something else, but he choked on his own sob and shivered, hiding his face once more. At least he hadn't told Draco to leave again.

Draco looked around helplessly, as though the furniture in the abandoned classroom held the answers to every question that was flooding his mind. Then, despite the fact he felt itchy and nervous, he sat down beside Potter. A random impulse took over him, and he pressed their shoulders together. When Potter shook again, Draco felt it in his whole body.

“Look, Potter. I’m–I’m _really_ glad you’ve decided to be there for me this year, but this has to work both ways. You can’t expect me to trust you if you don’t trust me back.”

At that, Potter raised his head again. He didn’t look at Draco, but that was okay. Eye contact wasn’t one of his strengths these days either. “I just–” Potter sighed brokenly, then tried again. “It’s nothing. I’m crying over _nothing._ ”

 _It can’t be nothing if you’re crying like the world has ended,_ Draco wanted to counter. He didn’t, though, because he knew exactly how Potter must be feeling. “Okay,” he said instead.

Potter wiped his eyes, but a sideways glance was enough for Draco to see that it had hardly made a difference.

“Why are you still here?”

 _I have no idea._ “I’ve already told you. If you’re gonna be there for me, then I’m gonna be there for you, too.”

Potter shook his head.

“That’s n–not how it works. If you’re here just because you feel like you owe me, you should leave. I already know you don’t care about me.”

“You already–” Draco felt his face scrunch. “You’re such a prat, Potter. You’re not entitled to decide who I care about!”

“C’mon, Malfoy. Everyone knows you hate me more than anything.” Potter had managed to more or less stop the tears from streaming down his face, but he sounded utterly _hopeless_ , and he was still leaning towards Draco’s shoulder as though he desperately needed the contact. So Draco thought, _fuck it all. I have nothing left to lose._

“No. Everyone _thinks_ I hate you.”

“Don’t you?”

Draco couldn’t help but snort. “You’re so daft, Potter. I would never have agreed to this friendship nonsense if I hated you.”

“I–” Potter looked him over. “I never asked to be your _friend._ I just offered to be there for you.”

“And I told you you’d regret your offer. If I’m not wrong, being there for each other is what friends do,” Draco said.

There was as moment of silence, then, “Yeah, I guess it is. I still don't regret what I said, though.”

“That means we’re friends.” Draco told himself he’d imagined the way his voice wavered when he said that, and bit his lip when Potter didn’t reply straight away.

“We are.”

“Good. I’m glad that’s cleared up.”

Potter moved, but his shoulder never left Draco’s. He put his glasses back on, then rested more of his weight against the classroom wall and sighed.

“So…”

“So,” Draco agreed. “Why were you crying?”

“I don’t think I’m done crying yet,” Potter muttered. Draco just raised his eyebrows at him, which made Potter scowl and look away. “Okay, okay. It’s just…it’s not important.”

Draco had seen Potter’s dead body lying at the Dark Lord’s feet, and yet, _somehow,_ Potter looked more vulnerable at that moment that he had at the time.

Maybe it was because it was Draco. There had always been something between them, after all. Something shrewd and irresistible; something dangerous and crude that stripped them of their walls and exposed their deepest fears and urges.

And now he was imagining Potter stripping himself naked. _Thanks for the analogy, brain,_ he thought grumpily as he felt his cheeks heat up. “It must have been important if it made you cry like that,” he said, in an attempt to prevent Potter from noticing.

"But it wasn’t,” Potter insisted. “Nothing happened. It’s all in my head. I keep thinking–no, these _thoughts_ keep popping up in my head and I... I don’t want to hear them anymore.”

“What do they say?” Draco asked.

“That… that I'm unimportant. That I might just as well disappear, because it wouldn't make a difference."

 _Ah,_ thought Draco. That was certainly something he could relate to.

"Potter, we're all unimportant. Every single one of us is no more than the product of an infinite series of coincidences. But you, unlike the majority of us, have already made a change in this world. Maybe... maybe that's why you feel like there's nothing linking you to it anymore."

Potter shivered and curled his legs against his chest to hide his face. And Draco did the least sensible thing there was to do. He searched blindly for Potter’s hand and held on to it.

Potter seemed to hesitate, but then he squeezed Draco’s hand, and something warm and fuzzy replaced every ounce of fear and uncertainty in Draco’s body.

“I’m glad you’re here.”

They both huffed uncomfortably. They’d talked at the same time, which was embarrassing enough, but the words they had said were so… _so stupid,_ Draco’s brain supplied. _So open._

“I thought you wanted me to go away?”

“I did. I don’t anymore though, or else I wouldn’t have said what I just said.” Potter squeezed his hand again, then seemed to notice what he’d done and released his grip. Even though he moved his hand away, he let their fingers brush lightly. Twice. “What did _you_ mean?”

“I–err.” Draco felt his cheeks darken again, and stared away from Potter. “You said you might as well disappear. I was just making it clear that so many people would miss you. Your two sidekicks wouldn’t know what to do with themselves without you, and it’s quite obvious that the she-Weasel isn’t as over you as she claims to be.”

Potter _laughed_. It felt unrestrained, even surprised, as though it had taken him off-guard, and Draco couldn’t help but look at him. His face had softened _so much_ , and his eyes were _glistening_ , and Salazar, Draco felt breathless and hot from it. And lost. So damn lost he just wanted to run away.

“Oh, Draco, you should see yourself right now. You’re such a bad liar!”

Draco felt dizzy and unbalanced from the use of his first name, and he raised his chin defiantly to counter the blush that he was sure was spreading through his cheeks and neck.

“May I remind you how convincing my lying was when I saved your stupid Gryffindor arse back at Malfoy Manor?” he huffed.

Potter’s smile faded, and their eyes met for the very first time in what suddenly felt like forever.

“You don’t need to. I think about it pretty often.” He frowned. “It nagged me to not know if you were just scared, or if… But now that you’ve admitted you’re glad I’m still here, I guess–”

“That doesn’t mean anything,” Draco quickly interrupted. “None of it does.”

Their fingers brushed again. He wanted to move his hand away, but he felt frozen in place.

“You just held my hand, Draco.”

Draco swallowed. “Stop calling me that.”

“Why? It’s what friends do. Unless…” Harry murmured, gently intertwining their fingers. Draco’s breath hitched. He really should have left when Harry had screamed at him. “Unless you want to be more than friends.”

“I–”

“But even then, I’d still have to call you by your first name. So one way or another, you're gonna be ‘Draco’ to me.”

He tried to complain, but everything that left his throat was a pathetic squeak. A _squeak_ , Salazar. So he sealed his lips, because there was no way he was going to be able to articulate a coherent sentence any time soon. Not when Potter’s– _Harry’s_?–words so blatantly implied that he was open to be more than a friend to Draco. Definitely not when the butterflies fluttering in his chest refused to calm down even as he breathed deeply, in and out.

He was completely screwed, wasn’t he?

“Hey–sorry if I read too much into your words and the, um, hand-holding part. We can always just stay as friends, if you want to.”

Merlin, why did this conversation feel more awkward than hearing Potter cry had? Draco didn’t want to reply, but he guessed he’d already done so by not moving his hand away. Sometimes he really hated what the git did to his common sense.

“That’s not what I said.”

“Oh,” Potter muttered. “Okay.”

Draco eyed him sideways. Potter was blushing furiously and biting his lip while he frowned at the floor, and the sight made Draco’s lips twitch. “Shall we date, then, _Harry_?”

Potter’s blush deepened impossibly, his fingers twitching around Draco’s. After the moment of shock, though, he smirked. “You might regret that offer.”

Draco’s heart did a somersault. Hope, a hope that almost felt like _happiness,_ soared through his body just as heat suffused his skin.

“Try me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kudos and comments are appreciated!


End file.
